NDOT Secret Santa

[Runo]

Sup Runoisch sorry for the wack core (Cinderace is good I promise just probably not SD).

It's been year later and you've have kept your promise 3MoreMinutes, Cinderace is super fucking good lmfao. Please help us get this mon out of the tier now I hate it so much. Anyways, it's time to once again comment on the goofy core you have requested but unlike last year, I had a great time building Terrakion + Skeledirge because I knew exactly what I needed to do in order to make this work and not be complete ass: Sub Skeledirge Offense. I know I know; it's revolutionary, it's innovative, it's the best Skeledirge team ever built? I bet you're wondering how I came to this incredible idea, well this great, wise, and mystical sage (Rafadude) once humbly regaled us with his adventures with Substitute Skeledirge and I thought to myself, "that'll never work. Skeledirge needs Wisp, Dirge always going to suck blah blah blah". But it was only after attempting to build Terrakion + Skeledirge that I was brought back down to reality and finally came to understand what all the talk was about.

The Skeledirge set

Skeledirge @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Unaware
Tera Type: Fire
EVs: 248 HP / 88 Def / 44 SpD / 128 Spe
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Slack Off
- Torch Song
- Shadow Ball
- Substitute

This is kind of an experimental set here but the EVs are built to outrun the base 50s and lower such as Iron Hands and Azumarill. while also avoiding Clefable breaking your Substitute with Knock Off allowing you to setup on it without losing your Boots in the process.

Now, on to the team finally


(Click on the Pokemon for the paste)

I'm not going to go super in-depth about this team here but long story short: I tried building TerrakDirge with other fours and none of them seemed as potent as this or just had very clear holes so just take my word for this sorry.

Team Notes:


Because of the rarity of Terrakion, people are going to automatically assume that you are running Stealth Rock on Iron Treads instead of Terrakion. You can use this surprise to catch them off guard and set rocks against the likes of Ting-Lu, Tyranitar, Iron Treads, and Hydreigon. Alternatively you can use this to bluff coverage you don't have such as Earthquake in order to scare away threats such as Sandy Shocks, Okidogi, and Iron Hands if you boost to +2. Conversely you can also use this to lure Clefable and sometimes Enamorus in on Iron Treads, since the assumption would be SR/Spin/EQ/Volt Switch looking at this team. Astute players might realize that your Iron Treads is not Rocks because of the lack of Leftovers or Boots. This facade can also get ruined if you accidentally switch Iron Treads into Knock Off as they'll immediately realize that it's Assault Vest. Running Leftovers can solve this although playing around Enamorus is a little bit more annoying without it.


I added Fightinum Z instead of Rockium because Ting-Lu will live the hit from unboosted Close Combat otherwise.


Building a team that is less than great into Sand is not ideal in the year 2023, but Thundy should be able to handle it. Click x if it's SD Giga Impact or Rock Slide however. Skeledirge can also deal with Excadrill in a pinch but it needs to be at peak condition and is notably ruined by Tyranitar if the Excadrill player gets wise and switches out.

There are other mediocre mus such as Enamorus and Meowscarada but both are somewhat outplayable albeit rough to do so.

Anyways, Happy Holidays

 

[3MoreMinutes]

Thank you Runo I gave you something that may be awful but is at least fun, unlike last year. Hopefully we keep up our streak and we get each other again next year.

Speaking of fun, this was not fun. I hated every second of using this piece of garbage shitmon Porygon-Z. Fuck you Rafadude (jk ily this mon sucks but I had fun kinda).

I started by thinking "why would I want to use z-conversion pz in mtar tier, after screens got banned and ting-lu dropped" so I decided I would try Nasty Plot. Slapped this together:

I won every game I played with this team and I think PZ got 1 kill across like 10 games. This set is so unbelievably bad please do not use it. Just be content knowing that +2 Z Hyper Beam ohkos Ting-Lu, it's not worth trying to actually experience it.

I then decided that I had to just use Z-Conversion and suck it up vs the bad mus, but I am not an HO player. I tried this:

Pretty sure I went like 2-2 in 1300s with this on ladder and decided to give up, shit is also ass. It's Alakazam (does 0 damage) + the slowest HO team of all time, I'm sure this is fixable but I did not feel like it.

I then decided to run BO and just slap a Z-Conversion PZ as a wincon. I made some nice MVenu stuff, and I also went back to the original team just changing the PZ from NP to Conversion. I'll put both here:


Both teams have spikes to try and wear down ttar/ting-lu, as well as a basic volt turn core in washtom + protean mon to maybe get PZ in a favourable position once every 10 games (I am not lying to you this mon is really bad dude). I like the Mtios one bc you can kinda spam aura to weaken PZ checks, but it has the unfortunate flaw of losing to Mega Beedrill very hard. I made it twave clef for this reason, bc the mfs running mbee are fully willing to go hard into it on clef. The MVenu one has a skarmory because skarm farms ladder, that is basically the entire thought process and is why I prefer the Mtios team. MVenu team is not actually very good I just got sick of almost losing to Mega Beedrill.

Sorry for this absolute mess of a teambuilding experience, I can assure you my thought process made even less sense. I will never be using Porygon-Z again. Note that the Mtios team has triple status on Exca + Washtom + Clef, I think this is funny.

 

[LOrd Fernado]

merry christmas Velcroc

 

[zastra]

sealoo your stall is ready
https://pokepast.es/aa961acd8cb83729

 

[Rafadude]

Merry Christmas Kin+ak (✧∇✧) (sorry I’m late have been traveling)
https://pokepast.es/b3987cd7fd5a3784

 

[Evie]

NDBH Reshiram for izlore
and

NDGG Ferrothorn+Primal Kyogre for Velcroc
Merry Christmas!

Also if you havent yet posted in this thread, please do by New Years

 

[BoingK]

Merry Christmas Amstan! Hope this is ok, I tried my best

Team notes

I had two parameters here, build with Gliscor, and build with Phione. Gliscor was easy enough, it's a fairly decent and versatile mon. Initially, I thought Phione would also be ok, albeit a Manaphy at home. It has a lower speed tier, which is just about the only good thing about Phione. The bulk drop is waaaay too significant for it to be a decent regenvester, and it doesn't get Tail Glow meaning it can't run a cheesy Motor Drive set. This means you are generally building and playing with 5 mons against 6, although Phione can come in against weaker hits to scout (if it got recovery it would have been a lot better for this specific team structure. Recover / U-Turn / Take Heart / Filler with GaG would have been really nice, but alas).

After trying and failing to build any form of balance, I turned to Gliscor's infamous playstyle: Spike Stack. Gliscor here runs Intim with a fairly ordinary moveset. Blissey is fairly mandatory to cover up for Phione's miserable performance as regenvester, and is here Good as Gold to help out against Defoggers and Scarf Fini. Blissey is the team's rocker. Ferrothorn acts as the team's Meow check because LordBox brought it and made me sad :(, and is just generally very very good. Here it uses 3 utility moves (Spikes, Knock, Toxic) and Gyro Ball allows for limited damage output. Iron Moth is the team's water immunity and is specially bulky, which helps into a plethora of threats including some Genesect variants and DesoWake. It also gets TSpikes, which is an added layer of fun not seen on Gen9OU Gliscor Stack teams. Discharge could be replaced with Solar Beam if you really wanted it. Finally, Gholdengo rounds out the team as the team's spinblocker, and is Earth Eater to bully most Tusk variants.

If you wanted this team to be more functional, I'd recommend Regen Fini or Manaphy over Phione. Or honestly, anything over Phione. Phione forces a really really awkward structure, hence this team is kinda ugly. But if you're insane like Amstan you can try to make Phione work in game. Have fun!